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Kolo a gonner – the next month is critical for AW

so it seems Kolo Toure will be joining Man City for any fee between 14 and 19 million quid, quite a fee for a 28 year old who has look well short of his previous quality in the last 18 months.

With Toure and Gallas not being the best of mates and also being of a similar style, something has had to give. One of them had to leave and it looks like Toure has drawn the short straw. The bloke is an Arsenal legend and is the last real contributor to our unbeaten season and astonishing 49 game unbeaten run that will never be forgotten.

Last season our defence was nothing short of shocking, every single long ball, long throw, freekick or cross was heart in mouth time, personally I never felt secure unless we were at least three goals to the good and on occasion even that was not enough. Pound for pound Gallas is the better defender and the obvious replacement for Toure in the starting eleven is Thomas Vermaelen and his contrasting style might just shore things up a bit.

Another thing that was lacking at the back last season was leadership, I am not saying that as a criticism because I think some players are natural born leaders. Gallas isn’t and neither is Toure, both are quiet on the pitch and the signing of Vermaelen, (being captain of Ajax at 20/21 stands for something), looks like Wenger has looked for a center half with aerial dominance and organisational skills. They were lacking a hell of a lot last season.

Now, I wouldn’t mind Senderos staying at all. He is quite experienced, despite still being young for a defender, Djourou is still learning and in those two we have good stand in defenders. Senderos also offers the power in the air and Djourou the pace. Silvestre is fine as fifth choice center back, nothing more than that. He is a liability.

It seems Kolo’s head was first turned my the Man Citeh millions in January and its a disappointment, at least he took his transfer request rejection on the chin and gave his everything in the last months of the season, something that he has done throughout his years at Arsenal and has made him one of our greatest defenders.

And after soon to be the second departure in ten days, Wenger has a job on his hands for the next month as he will be at least 30 million in credit, and it needs to be spend. A large portion of it does anyway. One long injury in defence and we could be getting jittery, especially as Vermaelen is only about to start his first season in English football. A defensive midfielder is a must now, and considering Song will be off to the African Nations in january/Feburary. should have been a must anyway. We have all the tools going forward but we now need to go back to the very basics, the saying ‘great teams are built from a great defence’ rings true.

With the money that Wenger now has at his disposal he can really break the shackles and signal his intent by going for a top, top class defensive midfielder. He will, as always, remain coy on his transfer activities but with two of our experienced players leaving, or set to leave, he will need to amend that.

Ray Parlour is confident the Boss will spend the money wisely, saying:

“He’s been there nine years, he knows how the team is run, he knows how the manager works and he is a very good player.

“But that’s football these days. A big bid has come in and it’s good money for Arsenal. You’re looking at £15million which is a lot of money.

“There’s a lot of centre-halves out there who you could get in for cheaper than that, who are maybe on the right side of 25 or 26.

“Arsene Wenger will be looking at centre-halves if he does go because you need four quality centre-halves, just as you need four quality centre-forwards.”

I guess we can only judge Wenger’s additions on September 2nd and his overall performance at the end of next season.

Its simple, Wenger has to buy now and there is no excuse of not having the money to spend. The 9.5 million spent on Thomas Vermaelen has been obliterated by the 25 million we received for Adebayor, and possibly the fee of around 16 million for Toure, which is way above his market value.

Another thing to note is the money that will be saved in the wages stakes, especially with Adebayor leaving. Toure would be on a fair whack too after his services over the years so there will be freedom for Wenger there too.

Armand Traore is also being pursued by Birmingham City, if VitalFootball are to be believed, a season long loan is most likely.

August is simply massive. Let the fun begin.

More tomorrow.

[UPDATE:Guardian say Kolo will fly to Manchester tonight and undergo a medical tomorrow]

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5 Responses to “Kolo a gonner – the next month is critical for AW”

hmmn,really interesting now. I kno AW is tryin to come up with sumthin coz I trust him. but sincerely, if he signs less than two quality players then I assure u dis season will be a JOKE & I’m goin to start chngin my opinion of him.
Pls Senderos is calamitous & u shld stop talking abt havin him in d team. I’ve been havin problems lately with names startin with “S” and today it’s Sylvestre & Senderos, we cnt afford to play those guyz. Djorou gives away stupid fouls, pls note that he gets really tensed up in matches but I still prefer him to d disastrous duo.

I’m very sad to see toure go, he is an absolute Arsenal legend, if Wenger doesn’t use the 40 mill then i will not be very happy. If he doesn’t spend the money earned from the transfers then why should i spend my money which i earn on Arsenal this season? Did you hear that weird story of Daniele De Rossi and arsenal.com? On arsenal.com it said he had signed for us but 10 minutes later it was taken down!